The biggest obstacle to immigrant assimilation is legal status, or the lack thereof.

By Elaine Ayala :
October 7, 2009

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The biggest obstacle to immigrant assimilation is legal status, or the lack thereof.

So says a new report from the conservative-leaning Manhattan Institute, "Measuring Immigrant Assimilation in the United States," which found legal barriers to citizenship - nonexistent in the early 1900s during Italian and Irish immigrant waves - are keeping newer immigrants from assimilating.

This happens despite proportionately more of the recent immigrants having better English skills and similar desires to be naturalized, the report states.

Political refugees assimilate more quickly because their status guarantees a pathway to citizenship.

More than 90 percent of Vietnamese entering the U.S. became citizens, Vigdor said, while the lowest naturalization rates are among unauthorized immigrants, a majority of them Mexican.

Learning English is an indicator, he said, adding: "If you are uncertain about the length of your stay in the United States, because you're concerned about being deported, you're less likely to learn English."

In the early 20th century, "there was no such thing as an illegal immigrant, among whites at least," Vigdor said.

Texas state demographer Karl Eschbach called the new report sound, its conclusions validated by a broad array of studies.

"The comparisons to early immigrants is telling," Eschbach added. "It reminds us that immigration is nothing new in the United States. We go through waves of high and low immigration."

He attributed the slower assimilation of Mexican immigrants, in part, to their "circular" migration.

"People are intending to go back. They're migrating and staying for several years and returning when they have enough to make a business investment."

Like other recent studies, the Manhattan Institute report found the recession has driven immigrants from the country and kept new ones from coming.

"There are two important policy messages," Vigdor said. "First, modern immigration has at least as many success stories as failures. Overall, today's immigrants are meeting or exceeding the progress exhibited by their predecessors of a century ago."

Proposed reform of U.S. immigration laws, often described as an overhaul, "should start from the standpoint that there are successes to be preserved, not that the entire system is an unmitigated disaster," he said.

Vigdor cautioned that concerns about Mexican immigrants and their allegiance to the U.S. are unwarranted.

"There has been no decline in immigrants' propensity to naturalize once they are eligible," he said.